This year’s Canadian Architect Awards was one of the most competitive in the past decade. Jurors Alison Brooks, Sonia Gagné, and Kelly Buffey met in Toronto to consider 184 project submissions to the professional Awards of Excellence program. Over two days of deliberation, they selected nine Awards of Excellence winners and five Award of Merit winners. They also reviewed the top graduating work as nominated by schools of architecture from across Canada to select four Student Award winners. Photographer Salina Kassam joined the jury to assist in selecting three Photo Award winners and two Student Photo Award winners.

This year’s winning projects embody the virtues of Canadian design: they are grounded in context without defaulting to neo-traditionalism; they are innovative without relying on trends that may soon look dated; in short, they value quality, thoughtfulness, and a certain degree of modesty.